The Brothers Pevensie
by el spirito
Summary: Peter struggled after leaving Narnia the first time and Edmund paid the price. How did going back change them? A bit of an AU starting directly before Prince Caspian
1. Chapter 1

Peter hadn't been the same. Not since the first time. Edmund supposed that was only natural, seeing as it was difficult for himself to make the transition, and he hadn't been High King, nor 25 years old when they went back to England. Knowing all that didn't make it any easier to watch his older brother self destruct in a way entirely unfamiliar to him, didn't make it easier to bear the harsh words and treatment. Edmund could handle it, of course, it was his _duty_ after all to handle it, to be where his brother needed him when his brother needed him. It was how he had acted since...well, since he'd changed, after the White Witch and all that. It had been simpler, easier to do that back when Peter had treated him as an equal and had appreciated everything Edmund did for him.

Not anymore. Anymore, Peter yelled at him and got angry at him over the slightest of details, picked fights with anyone and everyone, no matter their size or age and for any perceived slight or insult. Edmund could remember when Peter had stood down opposing forces, kings and messengers and generals, all trying to rile the great Peter the Magnificent, and unable to do so no matter what was said. Even taunting or threatening Edmund hadn't worked. Now, if a boy so much as looked at his older brother sideways, he had a fist full of Peter smashing into his face. And of course, Edmund being Edmund, the boy had a very loyal and very fighting-adept younger brother to deal with as well.

That was nearly always how it happened, Peter beginning the fight and Edmund ending it, or at least getting involved, and Ed knew that this one would be no different. They had just gone to the store to pick up a few things for their mother; it sounded easy and simple enough, but had turned into something far more involved when a boy Peter had once been friends with but had managed to alienate since coming home from Narnia, did the unthinkable. He insulted not only Peter, but also Peter's mother, and Edmund.

And now, Ed found himself leaping into yet another fray, thinking simultaneously that he was damn tired of saving his brother's behind and that his mother would have a fit. A fist smashed into his right cheekbone and Edmund saw stars for a moment. It took him another moment to realize that there were now more boys in the fight, and that he and Peter were outnumbered three to one. Not that they hadn't been up against worse odds in the past, but those times had included swords and shields and armies.

Peter was certainly holding his own, fists flashing out at his attackers, teeth bared in a war grimace all too familiar to Edmund. He looked ferocious, and if Edmund hadn't seen him in far more intense situations, he might have been frightened. As it was, he was too preoccupied with his own fight to consider his brother too much. Another fist clipped his chin, followed closely by a driving punch to his stomach that knocked all the wind completely out of him. He hated showing weakness as he dropped heavily to his knees, panting, trying weakly to fend off blows raining down on his face and ribs. He heard Peter shouting and realized that all of the boys had abandoned his older brother completely in order to focus on him. He struggled to stand, lashing out, grunting in satisfaction as his fist connected sharply with something that cracked and gave way, then found himself lying on his back on the ground.

"Oy! Stop it!" He heard being shouted, his older brother, presumably, then something large and heavy smashed into his face and he knew only blackness.

xxxx

Peter wasn't sure what had led to this moment. He knew that he'd been having a hard time adjusting to life in England -hell, who wouldn't?- but he hadn't fully realized how destructive it was until this moment. This moment, when he was watching his younger brother get the snot beat out of him because he, Peter, had launched himself into a completely unnecessary fight.

"Oy! Stop it!" He shouted, realizing even as he did that every single one of the half a dozen boys was surrounding Edmund. His stomach sank as he tried to throw them off, not certain how much damage was being inflicted upon his little brother. He screamed when he saw the rock crash into Edmund's head. Suddenly, the boys seemed to realize that the fight had taken a rather serious turn and disbanded quickly, leaving a bereft Peter kneeling next to his bruised and bleeding younger brother.

"Ed! Edmund, oh Lion, I'm sorry, Ed, please!" He gasped, gathering his limp younger brother into his arms. Edmund stirred and moaned, blinking owlishly up at him with swollen eyes.

"'S okay," he slurred, struggling to sit up and wincing at the movement.

"Take it easy," Peter admonished worriedly, but Ed stubbornly waved him off.

"Not that bad," he muttered and proceeded to stand. He was a bit wobbly for a second before regaining his balance, and Peter watched protectively, hands outstretched should he stumble at all.

"Edmund, I-"

"Pete. Stop. 'S okay." Peter shook his head, tucking an arm under Edmund's, smiling slightly as his brother tensed then finally shrugged into the touch.

"You have to stop, Ed," Peter whispered after a moment's silence, and he could feel Edmund shifting underneath him. He was only slightly startled when Ed pulled himself up to his full height, considerably closer to Peter's than he'd realized, and stared him down, deep brown eyes blazing.

"No, Pete, you have to stop," he spat, more angrily than Peter had heard him in ages, "but until you do, I'll be at your back." Peter nodded, tears welling in his eyes as he took in his battered, but defiant brother.

"I'm sorry," he repeated, and Edmund quickly enveloped him in a hug, though he winced at the contact.

"You'll always be High King to me, Pete," he whispered, and Peter cried some more, then helped his brother limp home. It was a long walk.

xxxx

Susan had hoped things would change after that day. She knew they had changed for her, and for Lucy. Peter had been half-dragging Ed by the time they stumbled through the door, and Susan had been horrified and shocked by Ed's appearance, bloody, bruised, and battered. Peter was sporting a few bruises himself, but nothing as extensive as Edmund's, and he had guiltily stared at the floor the entire time they'd been easing their younger brother onto the couch.

He'd been hurt, of course, the gash above his eye (that Ed had conveniently forgotten was there) had required six stitches, and he couldn't smile or frown without wincing for weeks, but somehow Peter had remained impassive, even through the rather hysterical lecture their mother had given.

Susan felt like her family was tearing apart.

It was terrible watching Edmund consistently, repeatedly try to get through to Peter, to get his brother to snap out of his clearly dangerous state of mind, and it was even more terrible to see Peter shove him away, every single time.

Now, as they walked through the train station towards the train that would take them to school, Susan knew that they needed to talk, though she knew that Peter probably wouldn't really like what she had to say.

"Peter! Peter, I need to talk to you," she said, grasping at his elbow. Peter turned and looked at her, exasperation evident on his features, and waved Lucy and Edmund ahead when they stopped uncertainly.

"What's this about, then?" He asked, looking at Susan with one eyebrow cocked. Susan sighed, knowing that Peter probably wouldn't listen to her.

"It's time you stopped acting like such a jerk, Peter," she said quietly, and Peter's face darkened.

"What exactly do you mean by that?" He muttered, voice low. Susan looked intently at him, holding his eyes.

"I mean you need to watch your temper, Peter, and you need to treat Ed like your brother! You've been shoving him away from you ever since we got back, and you fly off the handle at anyone who so much as looks at you wrong. Peter..." Susan allowed her voice to trail off. Peter shook his head.

"Su, everyone treats us like children, and we have to pretend that we are, that we've never been adults. And not just adults, Susan, _royalty_. They treat us like _children_."

"Peter, it's not as if you've been acting like an adult lately. How would High King Peter the Magnificent respond to someone insulting his mother? I know that you wouldn't have reacted so violently in Narnia." Peter shook his head in denial, clearly upset by her words, jaw clenched. He stalked past her without another word, and Susan sighed. She watched, biting her lip, as Edmund said something to Peter and was ignored.

Five minutes later, she was watching her brother start yet another pointless fight, was unsurprised when Ed barrelled past her to join in the fray.

Five minutes after that, they were finally waiting for their train to come, and Susan was just relieved to have her brothers acting like civilized human beings.

Another five minutes and they were in a different world.


	2. Chapter 2

A/N: Thank you for all the reviews, they're much appreciated. And I officially disclaim them, if I haven't already.

xxxx

They fell into their old routine quickly, Peter and Edmund off to the rescue of someone they didn't know and who could very well be a criminal without even a thought, Peter lugging the dwarf back to shore while Edmund hauled the boat up.

And then, Peter handing his sword to Edmund, wordlessly demonstrating the confidence he had in his younger brother.

Yes, Lucy thought to herself, it was easy to fall back into how it was.

She watched as Edmund took the sword, gripped it with fingers that suddenly remembered how empty they felt without a pommel to grasp, twirled it with a practiced ease. Watching him, Lucy was startled by the sudden remembrance of an earlier time, in Narnia after the battle at Beruna, the first time she'd realized that he was not only amazing but also dangerous with a piece of metal in his hands.

xxxx

Lucy stood in the hallway, idly glancing at the huge tapestries that hung on the walls. She knew what she _should_ be doing, but she also knew what she _wanted_ to be doing, and the choice was proving far more difficult than it should have. As queen, she knew that it was her duty to attend the refresher course on table manners Malina had deemed it necessary for Susan and her to take; as a sister, she wanted to watch her brothers practice their swordsmanship with Orieus.

The great hall branched off into two smaller corridors, one leading to the dining hall where Malina would be waiting, the other leading outside, and therefore to the practice fields. Lucy paused for a few seconds longer than it took for her to come to her decision so that it at least seemed as though she actually considered doing her duty, then skipped out the door to the training fields.

Peter was there already, running through a few moves with one of the fauns, but Lucy couldn't see Edmund anywhere. Frowning, she gazed about the field, wondering if she was missing something obvious, but saw no sign of Edmund. Shrugging, she turned back to watching Peter.

She was startled a moment later when footsteps approached, then stopped just behind her. Malina had found her, and if Lucy knew the centaur, she wouldn't be pleased that she'd decided to play hooky. It came as both a shock and a relief, then, when she realized that the footsteps belonged to Susan.

"Susan? What are you doing here?" Lucy asked, an ornery smile playing at her lips. Su always claimed to be so proper…

"Not a word, Lucy." Susan settled onto the grass next to Lucy and they watched silently as Peter finally performed a twirling move that appeared rather complicated and sent the faun's sword flying.

"He's quite good, isn't he?" Lucy whispered to Susan, who nodded in acknowledgement.

Edmund burst onto the pitch, running swiftly towards Peter in that awkward gait he'd developed since his last growth spurt, as if his height was still lagging slightly behind his feet. He said something to Peter, an apology for his tardiness if Lucy's guess was right, then paused a moment as if to catch his breath. A moment later, and both brothers had their swords drawn and held upright.

"Well, that's a change," Susan said, and Lucy looked at her in surprise.

"What is?"

"Ed's been practicing on his own, with Orieus," Susan answered. "He hasn't sparred with Peter for a few months now." Lucy watched her brothers' circling with renewed interest, barely looking up when Orieus arrived and stood next to her and Susan.

"Ed's got something up his sleeve, hasn't he?" She said, then gasped when Ed smoothly pulled a second sword out of a sheath that hung across his back. He was fluid and graceful, his movements completely belying the clumsy running they'd witnessed before.

"He's bloody brilliant," Susan breathed, then blushed at the strong language, one hand coming up to her lips even as she remained entranced with the scene playing out before them. Edmund was twirling swiftly and even Peter looked awe-stricken, barely able to defend the crippling blows Ed was raining down on him. Lucy looked up to see Orieus grinning almost proudly as he looked down on the fight, then chuckled to herself.

"You've been teaching him, haven't you?" She asked, and Susan smiled as Orieus nodded.

"Figured we should surprise that older brother of yours," he said, allowing himself a rare laugh. The girls joined in, watching in stunned awe as Edmund finally twisted just so and sent Peter's sword flying through the air.

"Is he very good, Orieus?" Lucy asked, still slightly taken aback.

"The best that I've taught, your Majesty," he answered, then seemed to think for a minute. "You'd best not tell him that, though. Wouldn't want him getting too confident." Lucy grinned and Susan nodded seriously, a hint of a smile on her face.

"Of course not. He'll never know."

xxxx

As Lucy watched Edmund fling the dwarf's sword from his grip and onto the sand, she strongly suspected that Ed knew exactly how good he was. She suspected that Peter knew it too, somewhere in the back of his mind, that he'd forgotten somewhere in the confusion and heartache that had come with their abrupt return to England.

Now, here in Narnia again, floating serenely down a river with different yet familiar trees and water and beauty, Peter rowing and Edmund, like always, steering him, Lucy hoped that perhaps, perhaps this would be the reminder Peter needed to remember how good Edmund was.


	3. Chapter 3

Trumpkin shifted again, certain he had picked the single most uncomfortable bit of ground in Narnia. All of the bruises and cuts he'd sustained over the past few days seemed to conspire with the hard ground to make sleep seem not only elusive, but nearly impossible.

Sighing, the dwarf shifted once more so that he was facing Edmund, and was surprised to see the young king sitting up, staring out into the darkness beyond the campfire.

"Your majesty," he said quietly, not wanting to wake the others.

"Hullo, Trumpkin," Edmund murmured without turning around. Trumpkin studied him for a moment, noting how the young king's sword was within arm's reach, how alert his posture was. He looked almost as if…

"You're on watch," Trumpkin said finally, and Ed turned around, a half-smile on his face.

"Old habits, I suppose," he offered with a small shrug, and Trumpkin looked at him quizzically, suspecting that there was more of a story here than Edmund was saying. Edmund looked down and blushed.

"It's just…it's just that…well, it's a bit of a long story, really…" Trumpkin looked at him and raised his eyebrows.

"I've got nothing better to do," he said in a hushed tone, and Edmund snorted.

"Nothing better to do except sleep," he chuckled, then sighed. "Fine. A few months after our coronation, so we were still figuring out how to behave like royalty. Peter and I were headed south. We were trying to meet a good majority of the Narnian population, those who didn't fight and who didn't even know about us, you know, involve them and all that.

"Well, we'd been traveling for two days already, and made camp that second night with no thought to a watch or anything of the sort. Stupid, really, and I should have remembered, but it didn't even cross my mind. One minute we're sleeping, the next I'm woken up to growling and something heavy falls on me.

"It happened so fast, and I still don't know exactly what happened, but I was a bit banged up and…and I was unable to help Peter fight off our attackers, something I still feel a bit guilty over.

"I woke up back at Cair Paravel sometime later, and Peter had gotten himself hurt. I promised myself then and there that Peter wouldn't get hurt because of my stupidity ever again, so long as I could help it, and from then on I was on watch or had someone I trusted implicitly on guard. It's never gone away, not really; sometimes I caught myself staying up all night back in Britain, and, well, tonight was no different, I suppose." Trumpkin and Edmund both went back to staring into the fire, a comfortable silence settling between them.

Trumpkin was quite certain that Edmund had downplayed certain events; he was convinced that for him to not immediately rush to Peter's aid, Ed would have had to have been more than a "bit banged up."

Looking at the young king across from him, Trumpkin noticed just how tired he appeared. The dwarf realized suddenly that he wasn't just tired because of lack of sleep, he was tired because of the burden he took upon himself, the burden of taking care of his family. And then it hit him.

This was Edmund the Just. This was the very same man that he'd grown up hearing tales of, that his mother and grandmother had portrayed as honest, fiercely loyal, always fair, the king who would follow his brother anywhere and who would protect his family no matter the cost. And, it seemed, to Trumpkin, there had indeed been a cost, aged a boy even beyond his extra years.

A sudden urge to help the solemn king struck him.

"King Edmund," he began, his voice a bit gruff. Edmund looked up.

"Edmund is fine, or Ed," he corrected gently, and Trumpkin nodded.

"Edmund then. Let me take watch." He could see Ed thinking, considering the dwarf's offer, before he nodded and settled down into a comfortable position.

"Thanks, Trumpkin." Trumpkin knew what the young king wasn't saying: I trust you. He smiled as Ed's gentle snores filled the air.

xxxx

"That's not how I remember it, you know." Peter's voice startled Trumpkin, who quickly glanced at the High King. Peter was lying on his back, arms tucked under his head, staring up at the night sky. Trumpkin remained silent, allowing him to speak.

"Ed started it out well enough, but not having a watch was as much my fault as it was his, probably more so.

"Anyway, I woke to growling, and for a second, I was so confused that I wasn't sure what was going on, then Edmund started yelling. It was so dark, and all I knew was that something was hurting my brother. I drew my sword and ran toward him, and just as I reached his side the moon came out of the clouds, and I could see.

"Neither of us had given any thought to those Fell Creatures that had made it out of Beruna or that hadn't fought there in the first place, but I realized the full implications of that oversight that night. There were two wolves on Edmund, one biting into his right shoulder, another into his left arm." Trumpkin did not fail to notice the pale hue Peter's face took on as he continued his story.

"I think I caught the first wolf by surprise, as I killed him easily and without problem, but the second was not so easy. We fought there in the moonlight, and I could see Ed lying so still, unmoving, just beyond us. I thought I was too late, Trumpkin.

"I finally finished the thing off, but not before he managed to gouge a chunk out of my calf. I limped over to Edmund, terrified of what I'd find. He was lying on his back, blood leaking into the dirt around him, his face so pale…I dropped to my knees next to him, reached a shaking hand to his shoulder." Trumpkin realized, looking at the visibly shaken boy across from him, just how much the experience must have affected him, still affected him.

"He opened his eyes, Trumpkin, and even in the dark I could see the pain in them, but all he said was 'Sorry Pete' before he passed out again." Peter drew a shaking hand across his forehead and took a deep breath.

"I remember sobbing as I bound his wounds as well as I could, then quickly binding my own leg up. The ride back is a blur, and the next thing I knew, I woke up with Edmund in the bed next to me. I realize now that his injuries probably weren't as severe as I thought they were, but I was panicked and scared and…" Peter's voice trailed off and he shrugged.

"You've never talked to him about this?" Trumpkin asked, realizing that Edmund had no idea how worried the incident had made Peter.

"No. I couldn't, Trumpkin." Peter shrugged again, then settled back down with a yawn. "It's nothing, now, just a memory," he whispered as he fell asleep.

As Trumpkin listened to the four sets of breathing, some gentle, some snoring, he shook his head. He knew it was more than a memory, and he suspected that Edmund needed to hear from Peter just how much he meant to the High King.


End file.
